Fox Shaped Hug Machine (Erika) @foxwitch@queer.af

so since the "anti-trafficking" law was passed:

* backpages has been taken down
* tumblr has become a shell of its former self
* craigslist personals no longer exist

but

* trafficking has increased
* prosecutions of trafficking have dramatically decreased and the Trump administration has even proposed to cut the budget for them by 80%

almost like it was never about trafficking at all, just about attacking queer people and sex workers

The idea that "new baby queers" are "too loud and obnoxious" about their identities is irritating at best and malicious at worst.

The queer community has ALWAYS been loud. ("We're here, we're queer, get used to it!")

Being loud and proud has been a constant in our fight for our rights. We should not have to be quiet just because you personally don't want to broadcast your personal identity to the world. You don't have to. But you don't get to tell everyone else that they can't, either.

I spent my whole life being told to sit down, shut up, and do what others told me to do. Be what others told me to be.

I fought tooth and claw for my identity, and I will scream about it however much I want. You can pry my gender and my sexuality from my cold, dead claws, you fucking cowards.

I'm queer. I'm nonbinary. I'm bisexual. I'm a maverique.

And I am here to make the majority uncomfortable.

— ​​​ Vik (They/them)

Might I draw your attention to this excellent Queer Villain Pride Flag art? by @distressedegg

https://gumroad.com/distressedegg

From the explanatory notes:
"WHAT THIS IS:
"An activism thing, except for when it isn't.
"A freaky sex thing, except for when it isn't.
"An avenue for personal self-actualization through identity experimentation, except for when it isn't.
"A manifestation of the slogan "be gay, do crimes".
"A coalition of people who grew up seeing queer-coded villains in media and were like "fuck it, big mood".
"A hopeless but fun attempt at community-building through campy theatricality in our nightmarish modern times.
"Bwa ha ha ha ha ha, etc."

This is such a #mood for me I don't even know how to handle it except by screaming "TAKE MY MONEY YOU MONSTER!" and running away to crouch by the mailbox.

you and only you decide if you're "disabled"

gatekeepers may decide you're not disabled enough for social security disability insurance benefits

but if you're having serious trouble holding down a job because of your physical/mental health, you might as well start the application process: https://www.ssa.gov/benefits/disability/

the worst they can do is make you fill out a bunch of paperwork and submit to a cursory examination, and then deny you (but you can appeal and/or re-apply after 60 days)

incidentally:

if you would like to help me continue to wade through this particular surgical swamp and maybe also get to med school and change it, donations are deeply appreciated: https://ko-fi.com/amphetamine

Republished from: https://twitter.com/hourlyFox/status/1163258035101470720

Stop policing POC on how to react to things.

Stop policing POC on how to defend themselves.

Stop policing POC.

Stop.

Just between you and me, fam

You don't have to be white in order to have that white mentality and be on that white bullshit

just a little tip

because I've seen this from non-white & white passing folks....

white supremacy loves us PoC fighting among each other

don't forget.

when we see ✍️ playvicious in someone's server blocklist we're already lifting the cover off the suspend button

feels like when folks say they want more poc on fedi what they really mean is "...who will assimilate & won't talk back"

playvicious rejects white respectability & it doesn't escape us that this makes large swaths of fedi feel anywhere from highly uncomfortable to downright pissed
suddenly folks care about "fediquette" a lot more
suddenly those (un)spoken rules start mattering a lot more
suddenly "they're misreading the situation"
suddenly "they're trying to stir up shit"
if someone gets rebuffed for their racism - whether intentional or not - and they exist in other axises of marginalization suddenly those axises have more weight

reminds us of how our last job started out with 8 Black new hires including ourself
we noticed that more questioning & critical someone was the more the eyes of supervisors remained in their direction
& that more tiny infractions like being a few seconds late that might've gotten overlooked if it were anyone else now really mattered
when someone raised issue with how they were being treated in comparison to the rest of the training batch & went through the ~proper channels~ they were soon gone
8 became 6 became 4
production week started with 3
by the end of the month it was down to 2
when we were dumped onto another company & subsequently laid off it was just us

the difference is that on fedi upholders of whiteness lack to ability to hold basic survival over our heads to try to force us to behave the way they want & lack the power to prevent us from building communities

this makes them very mad
& well...
that's too bad~
they can cool off with a nice cold permablock

— and 🔥

I’m not calling anyone out because this is useful 2 everybody. When nonwhites say something is racist it doesn’t ALWAYS refer to someone being a card carrying Hitler youth member, ok? More often than not we’re saying “this thing u do/say benefits white supremacy in X way.” But folks get so riled up over the idea of their personal brand getting conflated w “Racist💩 ™” that they vehemently defend their own identity instead of just altering the behavior we’re talking abt

quit worrying about if AI is going to be creating new consciousness

start worrying about AI learning how to enforce things like redlining and the glass ceiling

worry about it because *it's happening now*.

something something a ménage-à-trois of twinks is called a sub sandwich something

Fedichive is archiving the fediverse, but they're using a custom user agent to do it so

if you put this into your mastodon.nginx file, it's prevent them from pulling from your instance:

if ($http_user_agent ~* (fedichive)) {
return 403;
}

Heads up tho, they can still pull your servers toots from other servers that haven't blocked them, so please boost and help spread awareness <3

I recently had an aviation adventure helping @Norintha move across the country.

https://write.beach.city/pandora-parrot/pandora-moving-services-part-1

I posted about it previously, but just posting once last time in case you missed it!

#aviation

🚫 trans means you're a girl
🚫 trans means you are on hormones
🚫 trans means you are either a boy or a girl

✅ trans means you don't identify with the gender you were assigned at birth

The Science Behind Why Introverts Struggle To Put Their Thoughts Into Words

https://introvertdear.com/news/the-science-behind-why-introverts-struggle-to-speak/

Noting: spoken words

"If all else fails, and words escape you, don’t feel embarrassed — your brain is doing what comes naturally to it, and that is to pause and reflect. If you’re being quiet, you’re in good company with other deep-thinking introverts; as the brilliant physicist Stephen Hawking once noted, “Quiet people have the loudest minds.”

It's amazing to me how many hours are wasted by companies trying to find clever ways to protect sensitive data or resources that they don't actually need to have in the first place

Every single security person should have a habit of pushing for people to consider the simplest security control: stop doing the risky thing

If there's good reason to reject that option, fine: we can mitigate the risk. But *make people defend the choice*

@pandora_parrot I have the pic saved

welcome “cishet” loved ones (who are educated and respectful regarding queer issues) to join in genderfuck and queer expression. you never know who might enjoy wearing different clothes, being referred to in different ways, and discussing the restrictions that binarism has placed on our joy and self expression.

From WP: (I’ve read better sources expressing similar before, but this is what I have to hand)

Pirate leader Sugule Ali said their motive was "to stop illegal fishing and dumping in our waters … We don't consider ourselves sea bandits. We consider sea bandits [to be] those who illegally fish and dump in our seas and dump waste in our seas and carry weapons in our seas." Also[…] 70 percent "strongly supported the piracy as a form of national defence of the country's territorial waters".